


Gold Upon Grey

by Talullah



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Tumblr: legendariumladiesapril
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-03
Updated: 2016-04-03
Packaged: 2018-05-30 23:26:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6446455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/pseuds/Talullah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An offer for a new adventure.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Gold Upon Grey

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Legendarium Ladies April 2016, for the April 2nd prompts which are:
> 
>  **General Prompt: Estel Anim**  
>  Hope and its lack are central elements in many of Tolkien’s stories, and they come in as many flavours. There are the concepts of estel and amdír, there is Rosie Cotton’s stubborn hope that carries her through the occupation of the Shire, Túrin’s desperate hope to escape his fate that pulls Morwen, Aerin, Finduilas and Niënor into the trajectory of his ruin, Gilraen’s linnod, Galadriel’s hope to be allowed return to Aman… to start out the month, explore how a female character relates to hope or its absence.  
> ________________________________________
> 
>  
> 
> **Picture Prompt: The Tall Poplars Reach Out for One Another by[Cheryl Culver](http://www.russell-gallery.com/culver/gallery.php?artist=Cheryl%20Culver%20Christopher%20Hall%20Judith%20Gardner%20Barbara%20Richardson)**
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> ________________________________________
> 
>  **Poetry Prompt: New Year’s Resolutions, by Susan Sontag**  
>  Kindness, kindness, kindness.  
> I want to make a New Year’s prayer, not a resolution. I’m praying for courage.
> 
> [Disclaimer/Blanket Statement](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/profile)

**Dorthonion , F.A. 52**

“Daughter.”

With that single word, her father broke the bleak silence of the grey landscape. Finduilas turned and essayed a smile. ‘It is cold, it is always cold here in Middle-Earth, and damp too and it never feels safe, not with the Black Foe at a stone’s throw,’ she thought, as she watched her father walking down the hill toward her in small, careful steps, avoiding the most slippery parts.

She glanced ahead. The pine trees were of a green too deep, almost a shade of black. The rocks were of a charcoal tone, absorbing all light. The sky was gravid with leaden blankets promising the first snow. It is as if a curse was set upon the land, that all colour should be permanently drained, all life subdued. Finduilas conjured in her mind an image of the joys of the brief summers, when the pines released their scent, rolling white clouds lazily chased each other in the blue expanse above, and the birds sang their heart and soul from dawn to dusk and then from dusk to dawn again, in different voices.

“Autumn came early this year,” Orodreth says, sitting down beside her on a rock.

“It did, Father.”

It is always like that: “Father”, “Daughter”. Few endearments, never “daddy”, and yet, no one could have a warmer presence in her life, no one more dependable.

“We are growing close to the end of the year,” Orodreth said.

They stared at the horizon, Finduilas waiting to hear what her father had come to tell her.

“Uncle Findaráto sent a letter,” Orodreth started.

Finduilas nodded, still gazing at the pointy firs breaking the sky ahead.

Orodreth picked a lock of Finduilas’s hair and tucked it behind her ear, as he had done since she was a child. “He invites us to the fortress he is building in to the south. He says that he is building a smaller fortress in an island in the Sirion, and he wants me to keep it.”

Finduilas closed her eyes and smiled. “And shall we go, Father?”

“I think we should.” Orodreth paused. “I know you do not like it here, dear. And I am ever so sorry for having dragged you across that ice into this barren land.”

“Father!” Finduilas turned to face him. “I did not come here obliged, you know that.” She held his hand. “I was of age. I wish you did not blame yourself.”

Orodreth squeezed her hand back and shook his head. “You would have been better off back home.”

“Father, what is done is done, and I am not unhappy. I know that once our Enemy is vanquished this land shall flower and breathe. Do you not feel that too, deep in your bones. Everything is waiting to awake.”

Oropher looked into the distance and chuckled. “My persistent little kitten.”

Finduilas smiled. “So, tell me again about Uncle Finrod’s lands. I loved the watercolour you made when you visited him last year.”

Orodreth lay back on the rock. “At this time of year there is still some warmth. The trees grow golden and the light is eerie, but in a good way.” He laughed at himself. “I am sorry, child, I am no poet.”

“But you paint marvellously, Father,” Finduilas countered.

“The place was still being built, but what I liked the most about Nargothrond was the people. I found it oddly exciting, the mix of our own people from each house with a few Sindar, a few Teleri, an Avari couple who can barely speak Sindarin but who are the most excellent tanners I have ever encountered, the Dwarves…”

“Ooh, tell me about them again,” Finduilas begged, just like when she was a child and her father came home with sea shells or a new pet. Orodreth’s words failed to fit the standards of poetic elegance, but they flared her imagination every time.

* * *

“… and I met this old dwarf lady who read the palm of your hand,” Orodreth said, laughing, as they walked back to the walls, as the light dimmed. “She predicted doom to each and every elf in the fortress. It was really quite amusing. You should never get near her, lest you want nightmares about a dragon eating you.”

Finduilas laughed too, her cheeks hurting from so much laugher at her father’s stories. Before they crossed the gate, she stopped and waited for her father to stop too.

“Let us do this, Father,” she said. “Let us go south.”

Orodreth smiled at her and nodded once. Before he started walking again, Finduilas held his hand.

“Find someone to marry down there.”

Orodreth took a step back, appalled. “Sweetheart, I am still married to your mother.”

Finduilas almost smiled at the endearment. It had always been the way her father spoke to her when scolding her, as if to take some of the sting of the words. “Father, mother left you – me – long before we ever set ourselves on this journey. She voided your vows when she did not stay. She left us.”

Oropher inhaled deeply, preparing the words Finduilas had heard a thousand times. “Your mother did not mean any harm. She would have never left you if she thought I would not take proper care of you. She just needed to go away, she could not handl-”

“Papa, please stop.” Finduilas said, her voice low and even. “You have told me this a thousand times. She left us before I could walk. Did she go back to her family where you could have followed her and live the simple life of the Vanyar and all that nonsense she wrote in that ridiculous letter she left me? No, she went out into the wilderness of the west, after Nessa, doing Erú knows what. Did she ever give you a chance? Did she ever sought to see me as I grew up? Aunt Galadriel is more of a mother to me than she ever was.”

“Now, Finduilas, that is no way to speak, darling!”

“Papa, I have been good and I do respect you so very much, but I need to say this. Please hear me, this one time, chastise me if you will later. Your marriage should have been annulled, just like Great Grandfather’s. It is worth nothing. This is a new land. Find someone. And let us go south, please.”

Orodreth turned his face away from her, but Finduilas did not quit. She embraced him tightly, even as he stiffened and whispered in his ear. “Let her go. Find someone. Have another child.”

“You are too hard on your mother, Finduilas,” Orodreth said, after a moment. He stepped back from Finduilas and placed his hands on her arms. “I know you mean well and I will think about it. It should be quite a scandal, but in our family scandals…”

Finduilas laughed.

“But seriously, daughter,” Orodreth continued. “It pains me that you speak thus of your mother. Do not hate the one who gave you life. And you may not believe it, but she was doting while she stayed and I believe she loved – loves – you very much.”

Finduilas shook her head. “I do not hate her. I do not know her. I did hate her for a while, when I was younger but now… I do not claim to understand her but it does not matter anymore.”

“That sounds kind,” Orodreth said. “I am glad to hear that.”

Finduilas smiled. “Kindness, kindness, kindness. I want to make a New Year’s prayer, not a resolution. I am praying for courage.”

Orodreth kissed her cheek. “Well, that is a fine prayer. I shall pray for the same.”

Finduilas took his arm as they walked past the gate, into the courtyard. Above their heads, the tower bell signalled nightfall. Finduilas looked up, in time to see the doves flying back to their nest. Change, that was what they needed. Nargothrond would be a different, exciting new world. Uncle Finrod treated her father with respect and affection, unlike Grandfather Angrod. Those thoughts she dared not comment with her father. Her mother was one thing, an old discussion, her grandfather was something entirely different. She dared not hurt her father to point that his own father would never stop treating him as a hapless child.

Yes, south. A new life. A new year. Golden light. Safety. Happiness.

_Finis  
April, 2016_


End file.
